A wire chafing stand is a device used for maintaining and heating pre-cooked food at a location remote from the kitchen in which the food was originally prepared and cooked. The chafing stand is generally designed as an open structure preferably of wire rod steel to support aluminum pans into which a chafing dish can be placed. The chafing stand must also support a plurality of auxiliary fuel heaters which are used to heat the chafing dish.
Although the chafing stand has little weight its physical dimensions occupy substantial volume which makes it prohibitively expensive to ship on an individual basis. In fact, the cost of transportation from the point of manufacture to the distributor and/or to the retailer is a critical economic factor in the pricing of the wire chafing stand.
Currently, when long distances are involved, it is conventional to nest together a multiplicity of chafing stands for shipment in a stacked arrangement and then to separate the nested stands at the point of destination. An example of a commercially available chafing stand designed to permit multiple nesting is described by applicant in U.S. Pat. No. 5,921,513 the disclosure of which is herein incorporated by reference. This chafing stand includes an upper and lower rim interconnected by wire legs which extend below the lower rim to form the base of the stand and a plurality of offsets designed for displacing the legs to permit multiple nesting. The upper and lower rims in combination provide the structural support for the stand. The lower rim is also designed to include a plurality of holders for chafing fuel heaters. An alternative design of applicant which permits multiple chafing stands to be nested together is described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,520,354 the disclosure of which is herein also incorporated by reference. In this alternative arrangement one wire rim is used to form the frame of the stand in combination with two supporting legs, two handles and a plurality of offsets.
A wire chafing stand which folds up to minimize volume for purposes of transportation has been suggested in the prior art as taught in U.S. Pat. No. 6,234,068. However, in this design when the wire chafing stand is folded open the wire legs stand upright. This design is believed to be inherently unstable and is not user friendly in that it can easily fall over.